Personal Sketches of His Own Times, Vol. 2 (of 3). Jonah Barrington

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СКАЧАТЬ which then had due influence in Ireland, where agents, artisans, and attorneys had not as yet supplanted the ancient nobility and gentry of the country.

      Shrewl Castle, the hereditary residence of the Hartpoles, was in no way distinguishable from the numerous other castellated edifices now in a state of dilapidation throughout the whole island – ruins which invariably excite a retrospect of happier times, when the resident landlord, reverenced and beloved, and the cheerful tenant, fostered and protected, felt the natural advantages of their reciprocal attachment; a reflection which leads us to a sad comparison with modern usages, when the absent lord and the mercenary agent have no consideration but the rents, no solicitude but for their collection; when the deserted tenantry keep pace in decline with the deserted mansion; when the ragged cottager has no master to employ, no guardian to protect him! – pining, and sunk in the lowest state of want and wretchedness, —sans work, sans food, sans covering, sans every thing, – he rushes forlorn and desperate into the arms of destruction, which in all its various shapes stands ready to receive him. The reflection is miserable, but true: – such is Ireland since the year 1800.

      Hartpole’s family residence, picturesquely seated on a verdant bank of the smooth and beautiful Barrow, had, during the revolutions of time, entirely lost the character of a fortress: patched and pieced after all the numberless orders of village architecture, it had long resigned the dignity of a castle without acquiring the comforts of a mansion: yet its gradual descent, from the stronghold of powerful chieftains to the rude dwelling of an embarrassed gentleman, could be traced even by a superficial observer. Its half-levelled battlements, its solitary and decrepit tower, and its rough, dingy walls, (giving it the appearance of a sort of habitable buttress,) combined to portray the downfall of an ancient family.

      Close bounding the site of this ambiguous heritage was situate the ancient burial-place of the Hartpole family and its followers for ages. Scattered graves, some green – some russet – denoted the recentness or remoteness of the different interments; and a few broad flag-stones indented with defaced or illegible inscriptions, and covering the remains of the early masters of the domain, just uplifted their mouldering sides from among weeds and briars, and half disclosed the only objects which could render that cemetery interesting.

      One melancholy yew-tree, spreading wide its straggling branches over the tombs of its former lords and the nave of an ancient chapel, (its own hollow trunk proclaiming that it could not long survive,) seemed to await, in awful augury, the honour of expiring with the last scion of its hereditary chieftains.

      To me the view of this melancholy tree always communicated a low feverish sensation, which I could not well account for. It is true, I ever disliked to contemplate the residence of the dead:13 but that of the Hartpole race, bounding their hall of revelry, seemed to me a check upon all hilarity; and I never could raise my spirits in any room, or sleep soundly in any chamber, which overlooked that sanctuary.

      The incidents which marked the life of the last owner of Shrewl Castle were singular and affecting, and on many points may tend to exhibit an instructive example. Nothing, in fact, is better calculated to influence the conduct of society, than the biography of those whose career has been conspicuously marked either by eminent virtues or peculiar events. The instance of George Hartpole may serve to prove, were proof wanting, that matrimony, as it is the most irrevocable, so is it the most precarious step in the life of mortals; and that sensations of presentiment and foreboding (as I have already more than once maintained) are not always visionary.

      I was the most valued friend of this ill-fated young man. To me his whole heart was laid open; – nor was there one important circumstance of his life, one feeling of his mind, concealed from me. It is now many years since he paid his debt to nature; and, by her course, I shall not much longer tarry to regret his departure; but, whilst my pilgrimage continues, that regret cannot be extinguished.

      George had received but a moderate education, far inadequate to his rank and expectations; and the country life of his careless father had afforded him too few conveniences for cultivating his capacity. His near alliance, however, and intercourse with the Aldborough family, gave him considerable opportunities to counteract, in a better class of society, that tendency to rustic dissipation to which his situation had exposed him, and which, at first seductive, soon becomes habitual, and ruinous in every way to youthful morals.

      Whatever were the other eccentricities or failings of Robert, Earl of Aldborough (the uncle of Hartpole), the hyperbolical ideas of importance and dignity which he had imbibed, though in many practical instances they rendered him ridiculous, still furnished him with a certain address and air of fashion which put rustic vulgarity out of his society, and, combined with a portion of classic learning and modern belles-lettres, never failed to give him an entire ascendancy over his ruder neighbours. This curious character exhibited a pretty equal proportion of ostentation and meanness.14

      The most remarkable act of his Lordship’s life was an experiment regarding his sister, Lady Hannah Stratford. The borough of Baltinglass was in the patronage of the Stratford family; and on that subject, his brothers, John and Benjamin, never gave him a peaceable moment: they always opposed him, and generally succeeded. He was determined, however, to make a new kind of burgomaster or returning-officer, whose adherence he might religiously depend on. He therefore took his sister, Lady Hannah, down to the corporation, and recommended her as a fit and proper returning-officer for the borough of Baltinglass! Many highly approved of her Ladyship, by way of a change, and a double return ensued – a man acting for the brothers, and the lady for the nobleman. This created a great battle. The honourable ladies of the family all got into the thick of it: some of them were well trounced – others gave as good as they received: the affair made a great uproar in Dublin, and informations were moved for and granted against some of the ladies. However, the brothers, as was just, kept the borough, and his Lordship never could make any farther hand of it.

      The high-ways of Lord Aldborough, and the by-ways with which he intersected them, are well exhibited by an incident that occurred to him when the country was rather disturbed in 1797. He proceeded in great state, with his carriage, outriders, &c. to visit the commanding officer of a regiment of cavalry which had just arrived in that part of the country. On entering the room, he immediately began by informing the officer “that he was the Earl of Aldborough, of Belan Castle; that he had the finest mansion, demesne, park and fish-ponds in that county, and frequently did the military gentlemen the honour of inviting them to his dinners;” – adding, with what he thought a dignified politeness, “I have come from my castle of Belan, where I have all the conveniences and luxuries of life, for the especial purpose of saying, Major, I am glad to see the military in my county, and have made up my mind to give you, Major, my countenance and protection.” The Major, who happened to be rather a rough soldier and of a country not famed for the softness of its manners, could scarcely repress his indignation at his Lordship’s arrogant politeness: but when the last sentence was pronounced, he could restrain himself no longer: – “Coontenance and proteection!” repeated he contemptuously, two or three times: “as for your proteection, Mister my Lord, Major M‘Pherson is always able to proteect himsel; and as for your coontenance, by heeven I would not tak it for your eerldom!”

      His Lordship withdrew, and the Major related the incident as a singular piece of assurance. My Lord, however, knew the world too well to let the soldier’s answer stick against himself: – next day he invited every officer of the regiment to dinner, and so civilly, that the Major lost all credit with his brother officers for his surly reply to so hospitable a nobleman! Nay, it was even whispered among them at mess, that the Major had actually invented the story, to show off his own wit and independence; – and thus Lord Aldborough obtained complete revenge.

      On another occasion, his Lordship got off better still: – being churchwarden of Baltinglass parish, he did not please the rector, Bob Carter, as to his mode of accounting for the money СКАЧАТЬ